


That Mysterious Shirt

by saunatonttu



Category: Katekyou Hitman Reborn!
Genre: Hibari refuses to acknowledge the obvious, M/M, Yamamoto is only talked about, future arc
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-01-21
Updated: 2019-01-21
Packaged: 2019-10-13 22:31:51
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,006
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17496614
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/saunatonttu/pseuds/saunatonttu
Summary: In his future self's room in the Foundation hideout, Hibari Kyouya discovers curious items.





	That Mysterious Shirt

**Author's Note:**

> Prompt: "Teen Hibari’s reaction to stepping to his house in the future and finding out suspicious things in his future self’s belongings. also Kusakabe doesn’t want to talk about it at all?" 
> 
> Slightly modified - using Foundation's hideout instead of Hibari's house, but it should work as is. Thank you for the prompt, Atan. <3

The calm, traditional atmosphere in the wide and well-used room was disturbed only by the strange objects that lay scattered around in the otherwise well-cleaned room. Kyouya’s eyebrows knit together as he glanced at them with growing dismay, his fingers idly tapping against the handle of a tonfa.

He had left the herbivores behind in the other room as they were indeed crowding, and he had no interest in any of that. Kusakabe – ten years older, but his hair hadn’t changed – had followed him, but now stood stiff at his side for one reason or another that Kyouya had no real interest in aside from a passing curiosity. His attention remained on the few objects that hadn’t been put away. The inhabitant of the room had apparently left in a hurry or without care, it appeared. Or rather, Kusakabe hadn’t had time to clean it up for him, Kyouya mused as his disinterested gaze flickered to Kusakabe.

”What are these, Kusakabe Tetsuya?” Kyouya asked quietly. To some, his tone would come across as chilling. To this 20-something Kusakabe… well, it didn’t seem to _scare_ him as much as it made his lips twitch and purse together. Uncomfortable, but not because of Kyouya himself. Hmm. Interesting.

”Ah, well,” Kusakabe began, an odd stutter to his words as he carefully avoided looking at the baseball bat propped up against the thin wall by the side of the sliding door. ”We haven’t had much time to tidy your room up since… things have been quite hectic, Kyou-san.”

Kyouya raised an eyebrow. Kusakabe glanced away, which was a bit unusual.  Kyouya’s eyes trailed back to the baseball bat. Though, to call it a baseball bat was too high a compliment. For one, it was wooden and cracked. Old-fashioned. Its tapings were slipping and worn-out.  It might even been handmade. It had certainly seen a considerable amount of use.

However… ”Why would I have anything like this?” Kyouya huffed, his lower lip curling. Someone could have called it a pout, but luckily none of people foolish enough to do so were present at the moment.

Kusakabe didn’t respond, and so Kyouya cleared his throat. He wasn’t patient and certainly didn’t like to be kept waiting – surely Kusakabe Tetsuya knew that if he truly had been working under him for over a decade in this time. Hmph. Time travel. Kyouya didn’t care for the specifics of it, though it appeared to give interesting opponents.

And now… this. The bat wasn’t the only unexplained object in the room. As Kusakabe’s lips stayed stiff, Kyouya went deeper into the room.  The further in he went, the more noticeable the disarray became. The futon was decent enough, though a stray shirt had been tossed over the sheets.

A baseball print shirt, Kyouya noted as his steps halted instantly and his gaze narrowed at the article of clothing as if its existence offended and baffled him at the same time.  It looked absolutely ridiculous, even more so when it lay against the unoffending white of the futon.  Still, Kyouya found himself picking it up and feeling up the fabric as he glared down at it and wondered.

”I’ll admit using baseball bat as a weapon isn’t so bad an idea,” he began as he scrunched his nose, ”but why get a matching shirt?”

Kusakabe made a noise that sounded suspiciously like a snort. Kyouya turned to stare at the man, eyes narrowed into slits, but Kusakabe didn’t seem bothered by it even though he did turn his gaze away after a few seconds of the stare-off. Kusakabe’s voice at least reflected none of the amusement Kyouya had detected just now when he said, ”It’s not yours, Kyou-san.”

Kyouya’s eyebrows scrunched up further at the words. ”Kusakabe Tetsuya. What is that supposed to mean?”

Anything baseball-related could only lead to Yamamoto Takeshi, but that was where Kyouya’s understanding of the situation reached a dead end. It shouldn’t matter, but Kusakabe’s silence on the matter made Kyouya more irritated and curious – a combination that would usually make people get out of his way back in Namimori Middle.

Apparently Kusakabe had grown almost immune to the look as he didn’t budge despite avoiding looking at him. Kyouya scowled.

”It’s perhaps best to not ask too much, Kyou-san,” Kusakabe said, something strangely subdued in his voice that confused Kyouya further. His fingers twitched by his sides, which made Kyouya press his lips tighter together. ”That is how I’ve lived my life serving under… well, older you.”

Then Kusakabe muttered something to himself so quietly even Kyouya couldn't catch it.

”What was that?”

Kusakabe’s lips thinned into an awkward smile. ”Nothing, Kyou-san.”

They left the room as it was when dinnertime came, but Kyouya came back as soon as he had finished as he did not wish to spend time listening in on the useless blabbering surrounding Sawada Tsunayoshi and the computer-focused herbivores whose names Kyouya had forgotten. No need to remember them, really. Kyouya only needed to remember the redhead so he could punish him later for all this nonsense.

Alone in the room, Kyouya could dig through his older self’s belongings more thoroughly as no one was around to hold him back. Asides from the bat and the shirt, he found more inconspicuous things that suggested Yamamoto Takeshi’s presence in the otherwise bare room. Objects that didn’t fit into the traditional atmosphere of the room. Athletic things. _Silly_ things, like an exaggeratedly large wig that Kyouya didn’t know how to react to. It had blood on it.

There was a photograph squeezed between a book that Kyouya found in the desk’s drawer, the desk being one of the few pieces of furniture in the room. There wasn’t even a wardrobe. According to the baby, his future self (debatable) spent very little time in the Foundation hide-out as he was often out travelling. That was what the baby had gathered, at least.

And yet, so many of the few remaining signs of the room’s inhabitant somehow pointed to Yamamoto Takeshi or someone equally maniac about baseball.

Tucked into the corner of the drawer was a book of poems – bad haikus, for most part – but the contents weren’t what was interesting. What was interesting was the scribbled note on the corner of the title page, signed by _Takeshi_.

Kyouya’s eyebrows would at this point rub against the bridge of his nose if that were anatomically possible, so deep was his frown. Above the signature read: _Happy birthday, Kyouya._ The rest was smudged either accidentally or by purpose. Kyouya’s lips pursed tightle. There were very few people that called him by his first name, the horse with brither-than-the-sun hair being one of them. Yamamoto Takeshi had never been...

He leafed through the short book, grimacing more and more as he read through a few of the poems until he slammed the book shut and roughly put it back into the drawer as if it had burned his hands. Indeed, he mused, Yamamoto Takeshi’s presence was strong in this room.

Had Kusakabe brought him into Yamamoto Takeshi’s room by accident?

No, Kyouya dismissed the thought. The room belonged to a Hibari Kyouya without a doubt. The austerity of the traditional room, if the Yamamoto-esque items were excluded, was very much like himself.

Kyouya would sleep there, of course, as crowding with the others was _that_ unacceptable and as they weren’t allowed to leave the hideout for a while. Not that Kyouya usually cared for such rules – he was simply intrigued. Not because he could observe Yamamoto Takeshi this way, as well. There were many reasons to stay, truthfully. None which mattered. Hibari Kyouya did what he wanted, anyway.

That was why he inspected the shirt once more, feeling it up until he decided that it would do for a pajama this time. It was long enough to reach down to Kyouya’s knees, and so he ended up taking his pants off as well just as someone opened the sliding door and walked in, an impatient huff signaling the entrance. Kyouya has just finished pulling the shirt on when his eyes lift up to find a very disturbed Gokudera Hayato at the door.

”The Tenth wanted to-- wait, what the hell.” Gokudera’s eyes flicked to Kyouya, and a startled grimace spread upon the other’s face as soon as he realized what he was seeing. Kyouya stared back.

”Hm?” Kyouya raised an eyebrow at the suddenly speechless teen. His thumbs fiddle with the handles of his tonfas, and a slow smile spread across his face. Some relief from the annoying mystery ahead of him had come right on time. ”Causing such a ruckus simply by coming in, Gokudera Hayato. Is something the matter?”

”A lot of things,” Gokudera grumbled, but his face visibly paled as he looked away and bit into the unlit cigarette in his mouth. ”Why are you wearing a shirt that looks like it’s come straight from the baseball nut’s closet?”

”Why are you so interested in my sleepwear?” Kyouya asked, flat but defensive as he continued fiddling with his tonfas. ”I’m a picky sleeper, and the fabric is nice.”

Gokudera sputtered, and the cigarette nearly fell from his mouth. ”I’m _not_ interested--just... the fuck!”

It was almost amusing watch Gokudera Hayato get worked up, but Kyouya would prefer if he left. His grip on his tonfas grew tighter. ”There are many things that suggest Yamamoto Takeshi’s presence in this room,” he eventually said over Gokudera’s freak-out. ”I don’t quite understand it myself.”

Gokudera Hayato snorted out a thoughtless comment: ”Maybe the baseball nut’s been banging your future self against the futon and--” In the middle of it, a horrible realization dawned on Gokudera’s face and it made him swallow the rest of what he had been about to say. Or rather, he choked on the words and looked ill all of a sudden.

Kyouya’s scowl deepened, twirling the tonfa in his right hand. ”Do finish that thought.”

Gokudera’s visibly pale face turned more pallid, but he returned the scowl with a vicious one of his own. ”The mental image makes me sick enough, so no thanks.”

With one more sharp intake of breath, Gokudera turned away from Kyouya, shoulders sagging as he backed off from what had been close to becoming a tonfa in his face. ”I’m just… yeah, I’m gonna go back. Wasn’t anything too important, anyway. Tenth’s just too nice.”

When Gokudera made his exit, Kyouya thought he heard him muttering something about wanting to die. The tonfa in his hand stopped spinning, and Kyouya found himself more restless than sleepy now that Gokudera Hayato had gone. Something about his words struck chord in Kyouya, and he went through the drawer’s contents again.

A bookmark marked the spot his future self had presumably stopped reading, and Kyouya opened the book from that. Next to one of the haikus was a hastily scribbled heart.

The haiku went:  _The rainbow stands / In a moment / As if you are here._

When he closed the book again, Kyouya found himself with a strange feeling, one that he couldn’t explain as anything other then unsettling. Even as he lay down on the futon and pulled the covers over himself, sleep didn’t come easily as useless thoughts kept coming up. Kyouya grew irritated with himself, but… at the same time, curious.

What was it about Yamamoto Takeshi that kept both him and his future self intrigued? What was it that made his future self even _more_ intrigued than the current Kyouya?

Perhaps the answer was as simple as Gokudera Hayato had made it out to be, but Kyouya pushed that option out of his mind. Such things as _attraction_? The concept itself was laughable to him.

Even so, he slept in the shirt that most likely did belong to the older Yamamoto Takeshi, and it was a surprisingly deep and restful sleep despite the thoughts that had plagued him before his mind had finally turned off.

What a strange time period the future was.

**Author's Note:**

> The haiku used in the text is Takahama Kyoshi's (1874-1959).


End file.
